


autumnal

by superstringtheory



Category: Misfits (TV 2009)
Genre: Caretaking, F/M, Flirting, Hurt/Comfort, Misunderstandings, Nathan Young Being Nathan Young, Pre-Relationship, Sick Character, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-29
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-11-07 14:02:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20818487
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/superstringtheory/pseuds/superstringtheory
Summary: Nathan gets sick. He's really terrible at looking after himself.





	autumnal

**Author's Note:**

> Happy autumn, bitches. AKA the start of cold season, my favorite season of the year.

“Feels rather autumnal out, doesn’t it?” Nathan says. There’s a chill in his bones, making him shiver even with a jacket on over his orange jumpsuit. They’re all out raking leaves in a nearby park. Good for the community, their new probation worker had told them, leaving them off with a bunch of rakes and black plastic bags. 

Curtis looks at him skeptically. “Autumnal?” 

“Yes, as in ‘having to do with autumn.’” Nathan rakes another few leaves into his pile. 

“Three syllable word over there, you have a license to use that?” Kelly stops her own raking. 

“I read,” Nathan says, with an affectation of offense. 

“What, like  _ Playboy _ ?” Kelly wants to know. 

“They have smart articles,” Nathan says huffily. He lifts his chin. “I suppose you wouldn’t know.” 

“No, I wouldn’t.” Kelly looks him up and down then, and Nathan feels more naked than he does stripping down out of his civvies in front of her. He shivers again. It’s cooler out than he’d expected; a preview of the winter to come. 

By the time they’ve finished, Nathan’s exhausted and all he wants to do is take a shower and fall asleep. It’s a Friday, meaning that he has the whole weekend to catch up on sleep. Maybe watch some telly. Maybe (probably) (definitely) have a wank over Kelly and they way her tits look in the tight sweaters she’s been wearing now that the weather is getting chilly. 

He takes his time in the locker room so the others are all dressed in their non-delinquent clothes and heading out. He says goodbye to Alicia, Simon, and Curtis, who are all heading out at the same time and starts getting his things together for the shower when Kelly says his name. 

“Nathan.” 

“Yeah?” He turns quickly, and his voice catches- must be from being outdoors all day. He probably didn’t drink enough water. He clears his throat, trying to sound casual. “What’s up?” 

“I thought maybe you’d want to come around to mine on Sunday,” Kelly says. “For dinner, yeah?” 

“Oh.” Nathan clears his throat again-- there’s a tickle he can’t seem to get rid of-- and actually stops to think about what he’s going to say. “Yeah. That sounds good.” 

“Nothing fancy,” Kelly tells him then, a little aggressive. “It’s not a  _ date _ or anything, so don’t get any ideas.” 

Nathan puts his hands up in the air like she’s an officer of the law and he’s a criminal… and Jesus, that’s a scenario he’ll have to explore later on when he’s alone. 

“No worries. Just mates.” 

“Right. Just mates,” Kelly repeats, and then she’s gone too and Nathan’s alone again.

*** 

After he gets out of the shower, he realizes that he kind of feels like shit. His head is pounding, his throat is scratchy, and he can’t seem to get warm. 

Maybe if he goes to bed early tonight, it’ll all clear up. Somehow he feels like that won’t be the case, but a man can hope. 

All hope is lost when he wakes at five and can’t get back to sleep, his throat so raw that apparently his brain won’t let him return to the sweet succor of unknowing slumber. 

He makes tea on the stove in the community center’s kitchen, blearily trying to remember whether he has any paracetamol lying around somewhere. He has to admit it: he’s not just tired; he’s well and truly ill. He hasn’t been since he moved into the community center, actually, which is a miracle in and of itself. He supposes it was just a matter of time: it’s not like he’s doing the world’s best job at looking after himself. 

After the tea, he dozes, tossing and turning more than actually sleeping. Eventually, he decides that he’ll have to do something about it because the pain in his throat and the creeping, tickly feeling in his lungs doesn’t seem to be going away anytime soon. He bundles up in his jacket and scarf and walks to the chemist on the corner and purchases some paracetamol and cough syrup. 

The shop clerk tsks at him sympathetically when he has to pause and hack up a lung as he’s getting out the money. 

“Feel better, love,” she tells him, and Nathan just nods. God, he hopes so. 

The next forty-eight or so hours pass in a kind of feverish haze- Nathan spends most of them curled up on his mattress or listlessly watching telly in the community center’s employee break room, wrapped in a blanket. 

He’s so miserable that he forgets all about his not-a-date with Kelly until Monday morning. 

*** 

Nathan lets out a low whistle as Kelly walks past him on her way into the locker room on Monday and she doesn’t even turn her head. Ouch. She also won’t make eye contact with him as they’re waiting for the others to finish changing, and Nathan racks his foggy brain to try and figure just what he’s fucked up this time when it hits him: yesterday… which was Sunday… the dinner. The just-mates not-a-date dinner. Shit. 

“Kelly--” he tries, but she just holds up a hand and stands up from the locker room bench. 

“I don’t have time for it,” she says, and turns on her heel. 

She avoids him all the way over to the same park they were at on Friday. Nathan hangs back and sniffles to himself, coughing quietly into the collar of his jacket. For once, he doesn’t much feel like antagonizing Alicia or Curtis or even Simon. 

Nathan still doesn’t feel that great, honestly, and so he takes his time doing his allotted portion of the raking. Leaves: a perpetual autumn task. 

“It’s almost like we were just here the other day,” he says to the others, just because he can’t stand the continued quiet, but his voice comes out all hoarse and unlike himself, and then he gets into a coughing jag and has to stop to lean on his rake. 

Kelly stops as well and comes closer to him. “Are you ill?” she demands as Nathan’s still trying to get his lungs under some sort of control. 

“Er,” he says. “A bit?” 

“Come here,” Kelly says then, and drags him by the wrist to a nearby picnic bench. Curtis, Alicia, and Simon are looking on eagerly until Kelly gives them all the finger. 

“We’re having a private conversation,” she tells them. “So sod off and do your raking.” 

“Ugh.” Nathan takes a moment to tip his head back and lean against the picnic bench. He sniffles and then drags his wrist underneath his nose. 

“Sorry I missed our… uh…  _ dinner _ ,” he decides on eventually, as calling it a ‘date’ likely won’t get him any bonus points. “I wasn’t really in any shape to go out yesterday. I’m sorry.” He apologizes again, and Kelly sighs and sits down on the bench next to him, angling her hips in his direction. 

“And here I thought you were immortal,” she says, and her lips quirk up a little bit. 

“Still immortal, love,” he says. “Just not immune, apparently.” He turns his head to the side to sneeze and Kelly wrinkles her nose. 

“You sound awful.” 

“Well, be grateful you didn’t hear me yesterday.” 

“That’s not much reassurance, is it?”

Nathan looks up from sniffling and she’s scooted a bit closer to him on the bench, and then her hands are all over his face. 

“You’ve got a fever. Did you know that?” Kelly stands up briskly before Nathan even knows what’s happening. “Come on. You shouldn’t be out here like that.” 

“Like what?” God, she’s a force of nature. Nathan would be drowned by her hurricane any day, and happily. 

“Oh, you know like what,” Kelly says crossly, grabbing his wrist again. “Now let’s go.” 

***

It’s not like it’s the first time Nathan’s skived off early, but somehow this time it feels naughtier. Maybe that’s the fever talking, or maybe it’s Kelly’s simple proximity. It makes him feel hot and shivery all over. 

“Do you have medicine?” Kelly wants to know when they’re back in the loft of the community center and Nathan shrugs. 

“There’s some paracetamol and a bit of cough syrup left,” he says. 

“So you aren’t completely hopeless,” Kelly says, and picks up the bottle of paracetamol from where Nathan had left it next to his mattress. “Here.” She shakes a couple of tablets out onto her palm and holds them out. 

Nathan dry swallows them with a wince. He’s sitting down on his mattress and even though he spent the better part of the weekend here, he has to admit that it’s incredibly tempting to lie down again and hopefully sleep himself to health. 

“You should go back to sleep,” Kelly tells him, and gives him a look until he obliges and lies down, shutting his eyes obediently. It’s almost like she can read his mind, or something. (And why does he find how bossy she is so damn attractive?) 

  
  


“I’ll be back after we finish, yeah?” Kelly tells him, and Nathan cracks an eye open. 

“Have to make sure you haven’t choked in your sleep or something,” she says, and Nathan lets out a raspy chuckle. 

“Choking. That sounds fun.” 

Kelly smacks his arm for that, and he watches her walk away with a feeling that’s more than just appreciation for how her ass looks even in the orange coveralls. 

“I heard that!” he hears her call crossly as she’s going down the stairs, and he smiles to himself. 

“I didn’t say anything,” he calls back hoarsely. 

“You didn’t have to,” she replies, and Nathan falls asleep again smiling. 

*****

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up on [tumblr](superstringtheory.tumblr.com) if you like sickfic.


End file.
